Consumer Economics

Could you lose weight if you put $20,000 at risk? Would you finally set up your billing software if it meant that your favorite charity would earn a new contribution? If you’ve ever tried to meet a goal and came up short, the problem may not have been that the goal was too difficult or that you lacked the discipline to succeed. From giving up cigarettes to increasing your productivity at work, you may simply have neglected to give yourself the proper incentives.

In this up to the minute account of the current financial crisis, Dan Gross goes step by step through the timeline leading up to the October 2008 bail-out and explains what exactly happened. Using information and statistics only weeks old, he offers a thorough and enlightening analysis of where we all go from here.

Last Rights: The Fight to Save the 7th Amendment shines a bright spotlight on a grave but often overlooked effort by large corporate interests to undermine America's civil justice system and consumer rights. Trailblazing Plaintiff's lawyer, Jeffrey B. Simon, wrote this book as a rallying cry for anyone who has ever been wronged by a rigged system of laws. Through riveting tales of real courtroom drama, Simon exposes the insidious influence of corporate greed and political power weaponized to repeal personal rights and weaken public safety.

Starting with the publication of their seminal bestseller, Future Shock, Alvin and Heidi Toffler have given millions of listeners new ways to think about personal life in today’s high-speed world with its constantly changing, seemingly random impacts on our businesses, governments, families and daily lives. Now, writing with the same rare grasp and clarity that made their earlier books classics, the Tofflers turn their attention to the revolution in wealth now sweeping the planet. And once again, they provide a penetrating, coherent way to make sense of the seemingly senseless.

Over the last four decades, debt, bankruptcy, and home foreclosures have risen to epidemic levels, and the personal savings rate has sunk dangerously low. Why, in the richest nation on Earth, can't Americans hold on to their money? First published in 2008, Stuart Vyse's Going Broke described the epidemic of personal debt that existed in the years leading up to the Great Recession and anticipated the home mortgage crisis that started it. Ten years later, this fully updated new edition tackles the post-recession era of economic recovery.

Good works are no longer optional. For many businesses, success comes in unexpected ways. Toms grew into a $600-million company by giving away 35 million pair of shoes. Patagonia's profits have climbed year after year even as it funnels heavy investments into sustainability. And it's not just millennials rewarding companies with causes. In every age group, people commit to brands that show good citizenship.

Great marketing strategy looks like magic to the uninitiated. The mystical aura surrounding behavioral economics draws in the intellectually curious but has also confined the discipline to the fringes of modern marketing practices. Unpacking the drivers of human behavior is critical to connecting with consumers, but insights from psychology, neuroscience, and other fields are hidden away in arcane academic publications and books that aren't designed for practitioners.

The digital revolution poses a mortal threat to the major creative industries - music, publishing, television, and the movies. The ease with which digital files can be copied and distributed has unleashed a wave of piracy with disastrous effects on revenue. Cheap, easy self-publishing is eroding the position of these gatekeepers and guardians of culture. Does this revolution herald the collapse of culture, as some claim? In Digital Renaissance, Joel Waldfogel argues that digital technology is enabling a new golden age of popular culture, a veritable digital renaissance.

If the financial crisis has taught us anything, it is that Americans save too little, spend too much, and borrow excessively. What can we learn from East Asian and European countries that have fostered enduring cultures of thrift over the past two centuries? Beyond Our Means tells for the first time how other nations aggressively encouraged their citizens to save by means of special savings institutions and savings campaigns.

Bitter fighting over deficits, taxes, and spending bedevils Washington, D.C., even as partisan gridlock has brought the government to the brink of default. Yet the more politicians on both sides of the aisle rant and the citizenry fumes, the more things seem to remain the same. White House Burning looks squarely at the burgeoning national debt and proposes to defuse its threat to our well-being without forcing struggling middle-class families and the elderly into poverty.

In Cool, the neuroscientist and philosopher Steven Quartz and the political scientist Anette Asp bring together the latest findings in brain science, economics, and evolutionary biology to form a provocative theory of consumerism, revealing how the brain's "social calculator" and an instinct to rebel are the crucial missing links in understanding the motivations behind our spending habits.

A major new exploration of the economics of animal exploitation and a practical road map for how we can use the marketplace to promote the welfare of all living creatures from the renowned animal-rights advocate Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States and New York Times best-selling author of The Bond.

On the ten-year anniversary of the release of Joe Public Doesn't Care About Your Hospital, Chris Bevolo and Revive have set their sights a decade in the future with Joe Public 2030: Five Potent Predictions Reshaping How Consumers Engage Healthcare. The book explores five key ways consumer health engagement may change over the coming decade, covering everything from AI and personal monitoring to consumerism, new competition, the politicization of healthcare, and growing health disparities. The purpose of the book is to spark conversation about the future of healthcare.

Well, not that I am an expert, per se, but I am here to help explain the diamond industry to you so you can make an educated decision. My knowledge and experience go far beyond the average jeweler, and I want to share this information with you! My knowledge and experience go far beyond the average jeweler, and I want to share this information with you! I have successfully sold to hundreds, if not thousands, of men and women using the information and techniques shared in this book.

Taking behavioral economics from the cocktail party to the boardroom, with dramatic results Books like Predictably Irrational and Nudge have brought behavioral economics into the mainstream. But while we all marvel at how different-and weird-real people behave compared to the "rational actors" of traditional economics, in the end we go back to business as usual.

The OCC charters, regulates, and supervises national banks and federal savings associations and licenses, regulates, and supervises federal branches and agencies of foreign banking organizations (collectively the “federal banking system”). As of September 30, 2022, the federal banking system comprised 1,035 banks operating in the United States. In total, the banks within the federal banking system, excluding federal branches and agencies of foreign banks, hold $15.2 trillion of all assets of US commercial banks (64 percent of the total assets held by all US commercial banks).

La normalización de la precariedad, la pobreza y el “low cost” en la vida cotidiana es un fenómeno que se ha extendido a través de distintos medios y en muchos aspectos de nuestra cultura actual.

Christmas is a time of seasonal cheer, family get-togethers, holiday parties, and-gift giving. Lots and lots - and lots - of gift giving. It's hard to imagine any Christmas without this time-honored custom. But let's stop to consider the gifts we receive - the rooster sweater from Grandma or the singing fish from Uncle Mike. How many of us get gifts we like? How many of us give gifts not knowing what recipients want? Did your cousin really look excited about that jumping alarm clock?

Stand Out in the Age of the Consumer addresses how the internet has changed consumer connection and decision-making. Consumers trust one another more than any other source of information. This is the age of the consumer.

Have you ever bought a cold drink at a lemonade stand? Or have you baked cookies for a school bake sale? If so, you’re a consumer and a producer! Consumers, producers, buyers, and sellers all provide things other people want and need. How do they work together in the marketplace? Listen to this audiobook to find out.